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The Computer Science Colloquium Series is a forum for invited speakers, faculty, and graduate students to share research ideas. Everyone is invited to attend and participate. An up-to-date listing of the speakers and abstracts of their talks will be posted here. Please e-mail the colloquium committee if you are interested in speaking or know of someone who would be a good addition to our program. Thank you.
Colloquia are generally held every Thursday or Tuesday at 3:40 p.m. except during academic holidays. See below for specific times and topics. Refreshments will be served after every colloquium in the conference room, 223 Atanasoff Hall.
In some cases, the colloquium will start at 4.10 pm and refreshments will be served earlier starting at 3.30 pm. These colloquiums are marked with an asterisk (*) below.
Next Colloquia
There are no colloquia scheduled for the next 7 days. Please check below for future colloquia.
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Distinguished Lecture Series in Computer Science 2004-2005
The Department of Computer Science is pleased to host the Distinguished Lecture Series in Computer Science 2004-2005. For further information on the distinguished lecture series please visit this link .
Listing of Talks
Several other speakers have agreed to present but have not yet been scheduled. Potential dates for these talks are listed as "to be announced" in the table below. All other dates are open. Please contact one of us listed below if you are interested in speaking or know of a potential contributor to our series.
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Abstracts
1. Performance Modeling of Extreme-Scale Systems and Applications (Distinguished Lecture)Adolfy Hoisie
In this talk we will describe novel methodologies for performance analysis, modeling and prediction applicable to extreme-scale parallel architectures and applications. We will present ongoing and planned future performance projects in PAL at Los Alamos National Laboratory, based on the new methods that can be applied to next generation parallel systems -- 100 T-Ops and beyond.
In addition to the methodology for performance modeling, a variety of applications of modeling will be presented, including architectural design, workload characterization, code optimization and system diagnostics.
We will conclude by summarizing a number of factors that in our view will significantly impact the development and performance of future generation parallel systems.
2. A Price-based Approach to Resource Allocation in Wireless NetworksYuan(Emily) Xue
Wireless network is obtaining undeniable popularity due to its ubiquity and convenience. Designing an effective resource allocation mechanism for the wireless network is an important and challenging problem. The goal is to achieve optimal resource utilization and fairness among different network users. The key challenge comes from the shared-medium nature of such networks, where two wireless links may interfere with each other and their resource allocations are not independent. In this talk, I will investigate this problem through theoretical modeling, algorithm design and system deployment. By using an optimization-based problem formulation, a novel contention-aware price-based resource allocation model is established. In this model, channel resource is modeled as a set of independent elements that characterize the location-dependent contention and spatial reuse of wireless medium. Price is further generated based on the bandwidth demand and supply at each resource element, and is used to coordinate the resource allocation at different hops in a distributed fashion. Based on this model, I present a two-tier iterative resource allocation algorithm. Distributed across wireless nodes, the algorithm converges to a global network optimum with respect to resource allocations. Based on this theoretical foundation, I will further discuss the software architecture to implement such a resource allocation mechanism in an IEEE 802.11-based wireless network. At the end of the talk, I will also present the application of price-based approach to incentive mechanism design and the design of other emerging distributed systems, such as overlay networks.
3. Internet Worms, and Cascading Failures, and Epidemics (Distinguished Lecture)Donald Towsley
Many network phenomena are well modeled as spreads of epidemics throughout the network. Prominent examples include the propagation of worms (e.g., Slammer) and viruses, and, more generally, faults. In this talk, we apply epidemic spreading models to these phenomena paying particular attention to the following two questions.
+ What makes an epidemic virulent?
+ How does network topology affect the virulence of an epidemic?
In the context of a worm, virulence relates to the time required for it to spread. And in the context of the propagation of faults (cascading failures), virulence relates to the time until faults die out. We illustrate how simple fluid and Markov epidemic spreading models can shed light to the above questions for both worms and the propagation of faults.
4. Improved Abstractions for Aspect-Oriented ProgrammingHridesh Rajan
I will present my work on the design, implementation, and early evaluation of a programming language construct that unifies aspects in the style of AspectJ and traditional object-oriented classes. The work shows that we can unify aspect-oriented and object-oriented programming without significantly compromising the expressiveness of current aspect languages; that a unified design improves the conceptual integrity of the programming model; and that it significantly improves the compositionality of modules that use aspect-oriented mechanisms. The new approach expands the program design space from the two-layered model of AspectJ-like languages to include hierarchical structures. In particular, it enables a modular and layered separation of integration concerns. To support these claims, I will describe the design and implementation of Eos-U, an AspectJ-like language based on C# that supports a unified class and aspect construct as the basic unit of modularity. The underpinnings of Eos include support for aspect instantiation under program control, instance-level advising, advising as a general alternative to object-oriented method invocation and overriding, and the provision of a separate join-point-method binding construct.
5. Modular Aspect-Oriented ReasoningCurtis Clifton
Aspect-oriented programming deals with the problem of modularizing "cross-cutting concerns". Cross-cutting concerns are those features of a program that are orthogonal to the main decomposition of the program. Because of their orthogonality, cross-cutting concerns inherently result in the scattering of code across various modules in the main decomposition of the program. Aspect-oriented programming addresses this problem by allowing software engineers to write code for cross-cutting concerns in separate modules, called aspects, and to declaratively specify how that code is to be associated with events in the main decomposition at run time.
The declarative association of aspects with the code for the main decomposition is a powerful technique for eliminating the scattering of code. It can result in modules that are more focused and concise. However, the technique can also be used to write code that is difficult to understand and maintain. For example, the declarative manner in which aspects are introduced means that a programmer must, in general, have whole-program knowledge to reason about any operation in the main decomposition.
In this talk I will describe my research to understand the key issues in reasoning about aspect-oriented programs and to develop sound techniques for engineering understandable software within the aspect-oriented paradigm. In particular, I will discuss my work on "MiniMAO", an imperative core language for understanding reasoning in the presence of aspects and mutation, and on a "concern domains" type system for partitioning the heap to prevent unexpected modification of data by aspects.
6. Taming the Infinite: Verification of Infinite-State Systems (Robert Stewart Distinguished Lecturer)Amir Pnueli
Computers are helping us manage and control more extended areas of our life. The main obstacle to trusting to them more sensitive tasks is not speed or reliability of the hardware but rather the question of trustworthiness of the software -- the programs that drive and control such safety-critical applications.
In this talk we will survey advances in the most promising approach to absolute reliability of software -- formal verification. At a first glance this problem seems hopeless since even simple systems possess infinitely many states and even higher infinity of possible behaviors, and formal verification calls for exhaustive exploration of this infinite state space.
We will start by describing the effective methods developed for the handling of finite-state systems, which proved most useful for verification of hardware designs. Then, we will consider various methods, relying on different notions of abstraction, by which an infinite-state system can be reduced to a finite-state one and thus yield to effective analysis.
This general approach will be illustrated by several success stories, including the case of verification of device drivers at Microsoft, and successful analysis of the avionic software of the Airbus plane.
7. Toward Automated Synthesis of Highly Dependable Software SystemsSung Kim
Software continues to become more and more complex due to the growing sophistication and complexity of modern applications. Furthermore, today's highly competitive business environment demands accelerated development schedules to exploit windows of opportunities. In addition, it is necessary to be able not only to achieve high quality but also to rigorously demonstrate that high quality has in fact been achieved. Thus, success in today's global marketplace requires the capability to quickly customize and adapt products for niche markets and to satisfy diverse regional reliability requirements, standards, and procedures.
This research identifies several drawbacks with current software development methods and proposes a novel aspect-oriented design method to ensure that system properties can be mathematically inferred from those of its components. This will enable the development of highly dependable software systems. In particular, we address a fundamental challenge in integrating highly dependable software systems from existing commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) components. We have developed a method of constructing a repository of dependable orthogonal micro services that can be rapidly customized and automatically integrated together to build reliable application-specific frameworks. The method ensures that the dependability of the resulting application can be mathematically inferred from the dependability of the underlying micro services and the application-specific components. The approach has been validated for applications ranging from sensor networks to secure e-mail systems.
8. Specification LanguagesPatrice Chalin
9. Efficient Mechanisms for Securing Wireless Sensor NetworksWensheng Zhang
Wireless sensor networks are expected to be extremely useful for many environmental, civil, military and homeland security applications. To successfully deploy sensor networks, we must address various security issues since the failure or compromise of sensor networks may cause catastrophic events with impacts on our safety, security, economy and society. Securing sensor networks is complicated by the network scale, the highly constrained system resource, and the difficulty of dealing with node compromises.
In this talk, I will present efficient security mechanisms to address two important security problems: group rekeying and mobile sink compromise. To support group rekeying, predistribution and collaboration-based distributed schemes are proposed, where multiple nodes collaborate in updating group keys to revoke compromised nodes.
Different from existing work, the proposed schemes do not involve any on-site key server and the group rekeying is only a local event. Based on the principle of least privilege, multiple schemes are designed to restrict the privilege of a mobile sink without impeding its capability of carrying out any authorized operations. To further reduce the possible damage caused by a compromised mobile sink, efficient message forwarding schemes are proposed to deprive the privilege assigned to the compromised mobile sink immediately after its compromise has been detected.
Speaker Biographies
Adolfy HoisieAdolfy Hoisie is a Staff Scientist, the Leader of the Parallel Architectures and Performance Lab (PAL), and the Leader of the Modeling, Algorithms and Informatics Group in the Computer and Computational Sciences Division at LANL. From 1987 until he joined LANL in 1997, he was a researcher at Cornell University.
Dr. Hoisie's area of research is performance analysis and modeling of systems and applications. He has published extensively, lectured at numerous conferences and other important events in his area worldwide. He was the winner of the Gordon Bell Award in 1996, and co-author to the recently published SIAM monograph on performance optimization.
Visit Adolfy Hoisie's homepage here.
Yuan(Emily) XueYuan Xue received her B.S. degree in 1998 from Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, and her M.S. in 2002 from the Department of Computer Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Currently she is a PhD candidate in the Department of Computer Science at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She is a recipient of Vodafone fellowship. Her research interest includes networking and distributed systems with a focus on wireless networks, overlay networks, mobile systems and multimedia systems.
Visit Yuan(Emily) Xue's homepage here.
Donald TowsleyDon Towsley holds a B.A. in Physics (1971) and a Ph.D. in Computer Science (1975) from University of Texas. From 1976 to 1985 he was a member of the faculty of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He is currently a Distinguished Professor at the University of Massachusetts in the Department of Computer Science. He has held visiting positions at IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY; Laboratoire MASI, Paris, France; INRIA, Sophia-Antipolis, France; AT&T Labs - Research, Florham Park, NJ; and Microsoft Research Lab, Cambridge, UK. His research interests include networks and performance evaluation.
He currently serves on the Editorial board of Journal of the ACM and IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications and has previously served on numerous other editorial boards. He was a Program Co-chair of the joint ACM SIGMETRICS and PERFORMANCE '92 conference and the PERFORMANCE 2002 conference. He is a member of ACM and ORSA, Chair of IFIP Working Group 7.3, and cofounder and director of the Computer Performance Foundation.
He has received the 1998 IEEE Communications Society William Bennett Best Paper Award and numerous best conference/workshop paper awards. Last, he has been elected Fellow of both the ACM and IEEE.
Visit Donald Towsley's homepage here.
Hridesh RajanHridesh Rajan is a Ph.D. Candidate at the Department of Computer Science, University of Virginia. Before joining University of Virginia he worked as Member of Technical Staff for Bell Labs India. He received his B. Tech from the Institute of Technology, BHU, Varanasi, India. His research interest is in the software engineering of, and programming language and system support for, future, large-scale, distributed, software-intensive systems.
Visit Hridesh Rajan's homepage here.
Curtis CliftonCurtis Clifton is a Ph.D. student in the Dept. of Computer Science at Iowa State University, and expects to graduate in August 2005. His research interests include language design and implementation and software engineering, with an emphasis on software modularity issues. He is a co-designer and the main implementor of the MultiJava programming language. He has also worked on the Java Modeling Language for behavior and interface specification and on foundations of aspect-oriented programming.
Mr. Clifton holds a B.S. of Electrical Engineering and a M.S. in Computer Science, both from Iowa State University. Between his undergraduate and graduate study, Mr. Clifton spent six years working in industry as a process engineer for Procter & Gamble, Inc. and as a senior electrical engineer and software team leader for L&S Electric, Inc., a systems integrator for the hydroelectric industry.
Mr. Clifton is a member of the IEEE, the IEEE Computer Society, the ACM, SIGSOFT, SIGPLAN, and SIGCSE.
Visit Curtis Clifton's homepage here.
Amir PnueliAmir Pnueli received his Ph.D. degree in Applied Mathematics at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel where, since 1981, he has been a Professor of Computer Science, and since 1998 head of the "Minerva Center for Verification of Reactive Systems." Since 1999 he is a professor of Computer Science at NYU. Prof. Pnueli is the 1996 recipient of the ACM Turing award "For his seminal work introducing temporal logic into computing science and for outstanding contributions to program and system verification." He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the Israeli Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the 2000 recipient of the Israel prize in the category of exact sciences. He received honorary doctorates from the Universities of Uppsala, Joseph Fourier (Grenoble, France), and University of Oldenburg, Germany.
Prof. Pnueli is mainly known for the introduction of temporal logic into Computer Science and his work on the application of temporal logic to the specification and verification of reactive systems. Together with David Harel, Pnueli worked on the semantics and implementation of Statecharts, a visual language for the specification, modeling, and prototyping of reactive systems, applied to avionics, transport, and electronic hardware systems. His current research interests involve synthesis of reactive modules, automatic verification of multi-process systems, and specification methods that combine transition systems with temporal logic.
Visit Amir Pnueli's homepage here.
Sung KimSung Kim received his bachelor degree from the University of Texas at Austin and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in computer science from the University of Texas at Dallas. He is currently working as a Member of Scientific Staff at Nortel Networks, Inc. His research interests are in the areas of software decomposition, high-assurance software systems engineering, software reliability assessment, component-based software security and certifications.
Visit Sung Kim's homepage here.
Patrice ChalinBiography currently unavailable.
Visit Patrice Chalin's homepage here.
Wensheng ZhangWensheng Zhang is a Ph.D. candidate of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the Pennsylvania State University. He received his B.S. degree from Tongji University, China, and his M.S. degree from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, both in Computer Science. His research interests include wireless sensor networks, ad hoc networks and network security.
Visit Wensheng Zhang's homepage here.
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Contacts
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